Jon Creeden and the Flying Hellfish celebrate Thanksgiving weekend with a cohort of punks

Wednesday, 17 October 2018 09:56
Richard Amery

It was Thanksgiving weekend, so that might be why not a lot of people were around to hear John Creeden and the Flying Hellfish at the Owl Acoustic Lounge, Friday, Oct. 5. There was also a lot of other things happening including CD release parties for Jon Vornbrock’s new rap project Bomb Hugg and Paul Kype’s CD release party at Honker’s pub.

I was there for the Hellfish, because who can resist a band with a Simpson’s reference in the band name. And also because I missed Calgary Celtic rock band the River Jacks the last time they were here. So it ended up being an intimate show with a lot of prominent local punks all clustered in front of the stage sitting at most of the Owl’s tables all pushed together.

I caught the last couple Jon Creeden and the Flying Hellfish song aka Ottawa musician Jon Creeden backed by half of the River Jacks and Medicine Hat bassist Jeff Barrett.

They played a tight set including most of the songs from Creeden’s last CD “Stall” and a few tracks from his previous EPs. They wound up their set of spirited emo tinged punk with “Sensible Underpants.” They also played an excellent new song called “GT Storm Racer.”

A stripped down four piece RiverJacks were up next for an all too brief set of uptempo Celtic punk. I missed hearing their accordion player who had to work. They played a few older songs plus a couple of the highlights from their latest CD “Strange Adventures,” including “Dollars and Cents” and “Cut the Power.”

They also added a covers of the Dropkick Murphy's and even one of the Beastie Boys more punk numbers and of course plenty of Celtic punk tinged drinking songs.

The set was almost over before they began, it seemed that fast and they called it a night well before midnight.